Okay. I'll Keep on Talking Even if I Don't Have Much to Say.

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Right now both my hands are in painful ruins, and the voice software is ever so close - but not usable yet. It makes it hard to communicate. This post took bits and pieces of about 12 hours. Not easy ones, to tell the truth.

But I had a bad night last night. So. Why would that count any differently just now? Because it would have been way worse without the comments and emails I got before I tried to sleep. Add in the sense of reconnection with the readers who haven't checked in yet. Mona. I owe you a glad debt of gratitude.

You folks are a significant part of what's been keeping me going not just since March, but through some pretty rough times the last few years. For whatever reason, however it works, I don't seem to care any more. It does work, and that's enough for me.

Awww, mush! Enough.

heh heh! LL. Half-Korean/all-Southern motorcycle mamas are not the only tough ladies around. Which, ah, needn't necessarily preclude me requesting a bit of advice here and there. In my humble opinion.

My Pops. I've been worrying about you worrying about me since this whole long episode started.

I'm so sick I can't even review much of previous posts or comments. But you figured that out, plus that it really does take physical strength to heal and to write, and helped me out once again. That's just a part of why you're such a great Pops.

As to the potential malpractice (??!)...in this case I, mmm, left out that the goof was ours this time. Mistakes are almost always made, on both sides, right? To me, it's when they happen like what that jerk nurse did at Imperial Point that a line gets crossed.

I miss you too, all of you, heard from already and those to come. I hope to keep up posting, even little bits, but that means I'll have to stop a lot. A new bag of antibiotics has been hung off my IV pole, and I need to baby my IV site so carefully, it's time to quit for the night.

I'll be back.
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We're Here. We're Alive.

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Walter and myself have both been trying to let you know how and why we're here and alive - not just those bare facts.

But - forgive us - some bare-facting will have to do for a start.

I'm still in the hospital, the big one. I've been discharged and readmitted at least three times. After Walter and I recovered from the Chest Cold from Hell, I came here because I was coughing up small amounts of blood again, had bad lung and chest pain, and felt generally terrible.

So. Lung issue. Turned out to be pneumonia. Got isolated and treated and sent home. Survived.

After I'd spent a luscious day or two at home, Walter woke up from a sound sleep one morning just because my lungs were rattling so loudly the noise got him. We returned to the hospital, but this time under the admittance of my primary.

Far more serious this round: double (meaning both lungs) MRSA pneumonia. Fluid in left and right pleural cavities. 500 cc's had already been removed from the right pleural cavity, and it was rebuilding all over the place.

Combined with all that general ill health, another heavy outbreak of maybe-MRSA lymph node infections, and some other stuff, I almost didn't survive that bout. Meaning my parents, Walter, other docs should be notified, legal papers or verbal permissions signed or heard, all 'o that dreary ickiness...

I'm not trying to be a drama queen here. But it was an interesting experience. Certainly, it was unpleasant. Extremely. And frightening - though mildly! - in a way I'd never experienced fear before. Somehow I think we may be better off having a chance to approach death very closely once, just that one time, before it actually happens, before life is irretrievably lost.

Well, it went on and on. Cardiac catheters were prescribed to investigate why severe pulmonary hypertension had been discovered. Aaauuuggghhh!!! Turned out I need a triple bypass! But the Triple Bypass Doc on the cardiac team refused to do the surgery because I wouldn't survive it; I'd get an infection and die. Stents? Yeah, they might keep me going another year or two. He seemed to find them an uninteresting endeavor, though. He was, after all, a Bypass Man.

A nice Miscellaneous Stents in General man came by the next day. He felt HIS Stents could last a good 10 years. Besides, who could ever really predict lifespans anyway? We all looked at each other - me, Walter, Mom - and said, -Yes. A 90%, 70%, and another something-blocked vessel resulted in 2 stents in one vessel, one in another - and Stents Man was all done, and happy with his work.

More? Septicemia. Yup, good old-fashioned blood poisoning. A huge outbreak of what looked like MRSA infection, maybe coupled with other germs, through the entire right arm; another from the left abdomen through the entire left leg all the way to the left foot, with fevers that cooked bedclothes and required Cooling Blankets that were forgotten; urinary tract infection (yeah. Ouch.) and a neglect of testing and misapplication of coumadin, or something, resulting in waking up in huge pools of watery blood - I mean like 2 x 3 feet pools - that had leaked from tiny cuts, as small as little papercuts, in my arms throughout the night.

It's been quite a trip. Please excuse this rat-a-tat writing style, okay? Communicating verbally isn't going well for me lately either, although rumor has it that's temporary and common and goes away pretty quick.

So I don't know how much of what's happened I could actually get across to you. But I do hope this much did:

I survived it. All of it. And with all due respect to the Powers that Be...I intend to keep on doing so.
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